An ongoing court case between City of Lawrence Mayor Steve Collier’s administration and the Lawrence Common Council was the main topic of discussion during the July 19 council meeting.
During the time for council member comments, Councilmember Rick Wells said he had recently found out through a city employee and then through a Current article that the council had added Fire Chief Dino Batalis as a co-defendant in the council’s counterclaim against the mayor’s administration.
“I’ve made most of the recent meetings,” Wells said. “I know this situation has been brought up, but I don’t recall any decision made that the fire chief be named.”
Council President Tyrrell Giles said the issue of new Fire Station 38’s bay doors was extremely important to the council, so much so that the council specified in the 2021 bond ordinance funding that construction what kind of doors were to be installed.
“The fire chief decided to write a letter in defense of some of the other issues that were going on with the administration, and in doing that he admitted that he ignored our direction,” Giles said. “(It’s) another example that the directive of this council has not been followed.”
Giles said he supported adding Batalis to the council’s counterclaims to back up the council’s authority. The council voted in a previous meeting to allow the council’s attorney to file motions related to the lawsuit, working with Giles.
The council’s attorney, Kristina Wheeler, said the court has indicated that the council can add the claim if it chooses, and said that the fire chief had not been served with a claim. She also cautioned the council against discussing ongoing litigation in a public forum, which effectively ended discussion of the issue.
The fire chief was added as a codefendant through an updated motion from the council submitted to the court for consideration. The presiding judge on the five-judge panel, Kurt Eisgruber, approved the update on July 13. A summons for Batalis was approved on July 17.
According to court records, the summons states: “You are hereby notified that you have been sued by the person named as counter-petitioner and in the court indicated above.”
The counter-petitioners named in the summons are all nine members of the Lawrence Common Council: Giles, Wells, Sherron Freeman, Maria Rusomaroff, Tom Shevlot, Lauren Russel, Lisa Chavis, Shawn Denney and Deborah Whitfield.
In its amended motion, the council notes that during discussions in 2021 about the new Fire Station 38, the council expressly supported including four-fold bay doors that could be opened in the event of a power outage. That stipulation was included in the bond language, according to the motion. City officials later chose overhead doors, citing significant cost differences.
Collier’s administration filed a petition March 23 in Marion County Superior Court over the council’s decision to appropriate $250,000 to investigate who was at fault when the city’s 2022 budget was not submitted to the state by deadline in late fall of 2021 and reverted to the previous year’s budget. The council started the investigation in late 2022-early 2023 after learning that the city had been operating for all of 2022 under the 2021 spending plan.
Collier’s petition asks the court to declare the appropriation null and void, based on state statutes that say an appropriation cannot be made without the mayor’s recommendation. Collier’s petition also asks the court to rule that the council was at fault for the 2022 budget issue, because it allegedly failed to provide details needed for that budget to be submitted on time.
In its response to the petition, the council alleges that through the petition and other actions, Collier’s administration is attempting to avoid investigation. The council’s lengthy response denied specific allegations in the mayor’s March 23 petition and included counterclaims against the mayor’s office.
For more stories on this topic, search for “Lawrence Court Case” at youarecurrent.com.
Also during the July 19 meeting, the council postponed action on a proposal that calls for about $3 million of the city’s American Rescue Plan Act funds to be spent on a variety of city projects. The council has repeatedly postponed action on that proposal while waiting for the Finance Committee to review it. The first committee review was on July 10. The council decided later that same night to refer the proposal to a committee of the whole, which is not yet scheduled to meet.
Freeman had been a cosponsor of the proposal, but she asked that her name be removed. Shevlot is the sole sponsor remaining.
